


breathe with me

by Ryah_Ignis



Series: Season 13 Codas [21]
Category: Supernatural
Genre: 13x21 coda, Cas and Dean have a Moment, M/M, Sam flips Lucifer off, like I wish I could
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-05-07
Updated: 2018-05-07
Packaged: 2019-05-03 08:39:25
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,020
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14565234
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ryah_Ignis/pseuds/Ryah_Ignis
Summary: "We left him there.”Dean's hands scrabble uselessly beneath him as he tries to push himself into an upright position again.  Cas forces him back down.“He doesn’t like the dark, never did,” Dean says, breath coming shallower and shallower. “We’ve got to go get him.”In which Sam has to deal with Lucifer yet again, and Cas talks Dean out of a panic attack.





	breathe with me

**Author's Note:**

> Dean suffers a panic attack about halfway through this coda. If this is not your cup of tea, you'll be okay until the page break.

Twenty-six hours and fifteen minutes after Lucifer marches him out of the vampire nest, Sam’s legs give out.  He lets out a low hiss as his left knee slams painfully into a rock jutting out of the stream they’re crossing.  The right thankfully squelches into a particularly large pile of mud.

Lucifer stops mid-stride, head cocked to the side. “Come on, Sam.  No dawdling.”

Before, with Dean and Cas and Gabriel, he’d felt like he could have run a marathon and still had enough energy to jog to Dayton.  Now, with guilt lodged in his chest and a day of walking with no food or rest weighing his legs down, he doesn’t feel like he could manage a lap around a track.

Sam can’t summon the energy for a glare.  Instead, he turns his back to Lucifer as he perches himself on a root protruding out over the water.  Alarm bells ring in the back of his head—dropping his gaze before Lucifer was ready had warranted punishment in the Cage and he’d never even dared to turn away—but Sam fights them off.  He’ll be slower with a shattered ribcage or a broken femur, and it’s not worth it for Lucifer to kill him all over again.  Right now, funny as it feels, he’s immune.

“I need to rest.”

Only an immense amount of concentration keeps the little dancing spots from crowding his vision.  He takes a few even breaths, pretending like he’s just gone for a run in the woods outside the bunker.  Predictably, as they always do when Lucifer is near, his lungs refuse to fill completely.

“What’s the magic word?”

Sam’s answering middle finger takes very little energy.

Lucifer lands in the stream in front of him with a small splash.  He’d look ridiculous up to his ankles in muddy water if Sam’s heart would stop stuttering.

“I _said_ , what’s the magic word?”

He grips Sam’s chin, tilts his head up.  There was a time where Sam would have done anything in his power to not look him in the eyes.  But right here, knowing he’s invincible, that any interaction is on his terms, he meets him dead on.

“Is this how you’re gonna act with Jack?  Because let me tell you, kids don’t like a commandeering parent.”

Well.  He hadn’t, anyway, but that’s one time in his life that Sam thinks he’s been pretty normal.

He’s expecting the slap, so he rolls with it as much as he can with Lucifer’s other hand still wrapped around his jaw.  It stings like hell anyway, and the little grey dots fill his line of sight again.

“Take your break,” he snarls, finally letting go.

It takes everything Sam has not to curl into a ball and hope that he doesn’t attract his attention again.  Instead, he scoops some of the disgusting water in his palms and begins to scrub at the drying blood on his neck.

It’s a tiny victory, but right now, he’ll take what he can get.

* * *

Cas notices Dean’s swaying first.

“Is he—” Gabriel begins, tracking his worried gaze.

With a wave of his hand, Cas shoos both him and the woman along.  Dean won’t want other people around for this.  It’s doubtful he’ll even want Cas around, really, but he’s not about to let him go through this alone.

“Dean.”

He places one gentle hand on Dean’s shoulder and turns him around.  Dean’s eyes meet his, but they don’t focus, don’t seem to see past his nose.  He tugs halfheartedly at Cas’s grip, but he’s going nowhere fast.

“You need to sit down.  We’ve been traveling too long.”

To Cas’s surprise, Dean lets him maneuver him to sit with his back to a particularly sturdy-looking oak.  He sits down heavily, a marionette with his strings cut, still with the dead man’s stare.

“Can you hear me?”

Dean blinks once, twice, coming slightly out of his trance.

“We left him there.”

His hands scrabble uselessly beneath him as he tries to push himself into an upright position again.  Cas forces him back down.

“He doesn’t like the dark, never did,” Dean says, breath coming shallower and shallower. “We’ve got to go get him.”

Even with the weird, oppressive aura of this world bearing down on him, the one thing that Castiel is perfectly attuned to is Dean Winchester’s heart. He can feel it speed up.

“Dean—”

“I’ll have to tell her.” He makes a wheezing sound, like he’s choking on his own breath. “I’ll have to tell her that he’s dead.  That I couldn’t protect him.”

Beneath Castiel’s hand, even his shoulders start to shake with the minute trembles chasing each other up and down his body.  Cas kneels beside him and takes both of his hands into his own.

“You need to breathe.”

Dean shakes his head.  Whether it’s because he can’t or because he doesn’t want to, Cas doesn’t know.  So he laces Dean’s fingers through his own and forces them to rest on the pulse in his own neck.

Grace keeps it steady and even, despite the fact that he feels like it’s racing just as quickly as Dean’s right now.

“With me.  Come on.”

He takes a breath he doesn’t need.  Another shake of his head, but Dean follows a few seconds later anyway, taking in about half a gasp before he coughs it out.

“That’s it.  Keep breathing.”

“Cas—”

“Breathe with me, beloved.”

Finally, Dean’s lungs stop fighting him.  When he’s taken a few steady breaths in a row, Cas lets his hand fall, though he keeps their fingers intertwined.

“How do I tell her?” he says after a few moments of quiet. “What do I say?”

Cas lifts his free hand and brushes some of the sweaty hair off of Dean’s forehead.

“We’ll figure it out,” he says eventually.

When he gets a nod of permission from Dean, he sits beside him, touching from ankle to shoulder as they both lean against the tree.  Dean closes wet eyes and leans his head back against the bark.  Cas rubs soothing circles into his palm.

There’s nothing else to do.

  


**Author's Note:**

> This is fine :))))))))


End file.
